Angry Birds Hits 250 Million Downloads

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Rovio founder Peter Vestebacka and product managers Ramine Darabiha has revealed that Angry Bird has been downloaded 250 million times across all mobile platforms. They also revealed Angry Birds Magic, a location-based platform which will be built into all Angry Birds games.

Magic Places will work on any phone, says Darabiha. So you can think of Magic as a way to deliver new things via interactions in the physical world.

They are even making a new game in Wine and Dine which will feature the same characters as Angry Birds but will have different gameplay.

Source: TechCrunch

Wii U Website Names From Nintendo

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A recent discovery of website names that Nintendo has acquired suggest that Nintendo may be cooking up several established franchises for the Wii U. Of course, Nintendo might just be IP protecting, but it seems likely they’re setting the framework for some new releases.

Included are along with variations on popular Wii franchises like Wii Fit U and Wii Music U, several popular Wii peripheral devices like Wii U Balance Board and Wii Speak U, in addition to possible games like Rhythm Paradise Wii, Kirby Wii and Super Mario Bros. U. Finally, Wii Universe is a tantalizing name, perhaps hinting at a larger online offering.

Source: Nintendo World Report

Duke Nukem PR Gaff Goes Nuclear

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The PR group representing The Redner Group issued a tweet today threatening to withhold review copies from certain reviewers of Duke Nukem Forever because of too much venom. After the highlight negative response, some Twitter backtracking was done thought it wasn’t enough to stop 2K Games from dismissing them.

“2K Games does not endorse or condone the comments made by @TheRednerGroup and confirm they no longer represent our products,” tweeted 2K Games. “We maintain a mutually respectful relationship with the press and will continue to do so. We don’t condone @The RednerGroup’s actions at all.

Source: Twitter

EA Talks Exclusivity In Origin

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Electronic Arts recently announced that they will be launching their own digital storefront in Origin. The first sign that the publisher was looking towards exclusivity, Valve has removed Crysis 2 from Steam.

“We are going to continue to be great partners for our retail channel partners as they evolve their business models to account for digital,” said Frank Gibeau, president of EA Games. “But at the same time you talk about platform exclusives like Halo or Uncharted, EA’s going to have some of our own platform exclusives.”

“For us it’s really about, we’re the worldwide leader in packaged goods publishing, we’d like to be the worldwide leader in digital publishing, added Gibeau. “And we think that EA has unique strengths there related to what we can do with our content, because we’re a content creator as well as a retailer in this business. But in general it’s not just a retail site, it’s a community, it’s a platform, it has traits much like you see with Steam or PSN or Xbox Live, but it’s unique to EA.

While Crysis 2 and Alice: Madness Returns are building blocks for Origin, EA sees Star Wars: The Old Republic as a major keystone. “In the case of Star Wars we’re trying to build an audience for Origin. And it’s also an opportunity for us to better manage the downloads and how we bring people over from the beta and that sort of thing. For a lot of reasons it made sense for an MMO, which is a highly complex deployment, Gibeau continued. “I think long-term you’ll see we believe in reach so we will have other digital retailers for out products because we want to reach as many audiences as possible. But at the same time if we can use exclusive content or other ideas to help grow our audience then we’re going to do that because we’re growing a platform.

Source: GamesIndustry.biz

Google Rolls Out Chrome Voice Search

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Google recently debuted some new functionality for their search engine, including voice search in 27 languages via the Chrome browser. Mobile users will be able to see local recommendations and have a slideshow view.

Another Chrome feature will be the ability to search via a url or an image. Finally, users will be able to take advantage of Instant Pages in Chrome which will load page results automatically in your browser depending on your result.

Source: Wired

Gears Of War On PS3 – Cliff Bleszinski Shoots It Down

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Rumors that the Gears of War franchise will be coming to PS3 have persisted since Epic Games President Mike Capps said he would love to bring the franchise to Sony’s platform. However, Epic design director Cliff Bleszinski says it’s not very likely.

“I would say in the foreseeable future there s zero chances of Gears of War being on the PlayStation 3,” said Bleszinski. “Can we bury that now? Seriously. It s like, we have a great deal with Microsoft, they re a great partner…”

Source: IndustryGamers {link no longer active}

‘Alice: Madness Returns’ Opens Up The Doors To The Asylum

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The official website for EA’s Alice: Madness Returns plunges fans deep into the psychotic cortex of American McGee’s latest installment in the epic series based loosely on the books by Lewis Carroll. Extended onto iOS devices {link no longer active}, Alice: Madness Returns, uncover the lost years of Alice’s stay in Rutledge Asylum in an interactive storybook as she slips deeper into her madness. Discover a Wonderland composed of equal parts beauty and terror as Alice slips between the cracks of this world and the world within as visions of madness come to life through interactive elements and animations. Fans with an iPhone 4 or iPad 2 can use smile recognition to interact with the Cheshire cat. The interactive storybook can also be viewed in full screen {page no longer active} on the official Facebook page for the game. Back at the official destination, fans can Explore Wonderland (Queensland, Mysterious East, Dollhouse, etc.) through a series of flash movies and brief interactive scenes, each with its own downloadable wallpaper. On Twitter, the White Rabbit has been engaging with fans and keeping them up to date with developer chats and up to the minute breaking news.